Alumna Receives Prestigious Award, Credits CHS Teacher as Mentor

On Friday, November 7, 2025, CHS alumna Anna Turk Karan ‘22 became one of 18 recipients of the University of Maryland’s Philip Merrill Scholars Award. An exceptional leader, Turk Karan earned this award from the College of Behavioral and Social Sciences, where she studies psychology.

The program, established through a generous gift from the late publisher Philip Merrill, recognizes the achievements of the students and the mentors who profoundly impacted their academic success. Turk Karan, who ran extracurricular programs and was very involved in the CHS Skills for Life program, selected her K-12 mentor, Mr. Philip Cohen from Cheltenham High School. Cohen is one of the CHS Skills for Life teachers.

“Mr. Cohen embodies kindness, intellect and what it means to be a true teacher,” she said. “Mr. Cohen, through his unwavering commitment to every student who crosses his path, transformed how I see leadership.”

Turk Karan always dedicated herself to help students with disabilities, according to Cohen. In ninth grade, she helped with the Special Olympics, leading to her   becoming a leader of the Panther Partners, a program which pairs students with and without disabilities for social activities and community service. She single handedly raised the level of the Panther Partners Program to include a virtual option during the global pandemic. Turk Karan was a senior intern with Cohen and co-taught social skills for her entire senior year. She created her own unit to teach students in Skills For Life about the psychology of perception and adapted all materials to meet the varying comprehension and ability levels for all of the students in class. 

“Anna is the ultimate leader filled with innovation, compassion, and impeccable follow through, and it is the most rewarding thing to see her doing these things in college,” Cohen said. “Anna also always follows up with students from Skills for Life and visits the students when she is on break from college.

“Anna calls me a mentor,” he continued, “but in many ways she is a mentor for our Skills for Life Program at Cheltenham High School and myself as an educator and a person. Anna exemplifies tenacious kindness, extraordinary creativity, and is a larger than life force who makes a profound positive impact with everything she puts her efforts into.”